Tobias Sippel
 | |||
| Personal information | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Full name | Tobias Sippel | ||
| Height | 1.88 m (6 ft 2 in) | ||
| Position(s) | Goalkeeper | ||
| Team information | |||
Current team | Kaiserslautern | ||
| ‡ National team caps and goals, correct as of October 28, 2008 | |||
Tobias Sippel (born March 22, 1988 in Bad Dürkheim) is a German football goalkeeper who plays for FC Kaiserslautern in the 2. Bundesliga.
Youth career
Sippel began his football career playing for his hometown club of SV 1911 Bad Dürkheim. While with Bad Dürkheim, he rose through the youth ranks culminating as the first goalkeeper for their 2005 entry in the Regionalliga Süd (Tier 4 of the German football league system) at the age of 17.
FC Kaiserslautern
In 2006, first Bundesliga club 1. FC Kaiserslautern signed him to his first professional contract.
Sippel spent one season playing with FC Kaiserslautern II in the Oberliga Südwest (currently Tier 5 of the German football league system, but Tier 4 when Sippel played). After one year, he joined the first team as the third keeper behind Jürgen Macho and Florian Fromlowitz. The previous season had seen FC Kaiserslautern relegated from the first Bundesliga to the second Bundesliga. He ascended to the second keeper behind U-21 national keeper Florian Fromlowitz when Jürgen Macho left Kaiserslautern to play for the Greek top club AEK Athens.
Ten games into the 2007-2008 season, Fromlowitz was injured thrusting Sippel into the role of starting goal keeper. He helped FC Kaiserslautern avoid relegation to the 3rd Liga on the last day of the season with a clean sheet versus already promoted FC Köln.
The 2008-2009 campaign started with a bang for Sippel as FC Kaiserslautern shot to the top of the league table anchored by their number one goalkeeper, however nine games into the season, Sippel broke his arm on a freak play during a 2-1 win versus Rot-Weiß Oberhausen. He is currently on injured reserve until the beginning of 2009.